Nicole Margaret Mitchell has been noted as “a compelling improviser of wit, determination, positivity, and tremendous talent…on her way to becoming one of the greatest living flutists in jazz,” (Peter Margasak, Chicago Reader). A creative flutist, composer and bandleader, Mitchell has been named “Top Flutist 2010″ by Downbeat Magazine’s Critic’s Polls and also placed first as Downbeat magazine’s “Rising Star Flutist 2005-2010. She was awarded “Jazz Flutist of the Year 2010″by the Jazz Journalist Association and ““Chicagoan of the Year 2006” by the Chicago Tribune. The founder of the critically acclaimed Black Earth Ensemble and Black Earth Strings, Mitchell’s compositions reach across sound worlds, integrating new ideas with moments in the legacy of jazz, gospel, pop, and African percussion to create a fascinating synthesis of “postmodern jazz.” With her ensembles, as a featured flutist, and as a music educator, Mitchell has been a highlight at art venues, festivals throughout Europe, the U.S. and Canada. Mitchell has performed with creative luminaries including George Lewis, Miya Masaoka, Lori Freedman, James Newton, Bill Dixon and Muhal Richard Abrams. She also works on ongoing projects with Anthony Braxton, Ed Wilkerson, David Boykin, Rob Mazurek, Hamid Drake and Arveeayl Ra. The first woman president of Chicago’s groundbreaking Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), Mitchell works to raise respect and integrity for the improvised flute, to contribute her innovative voice to the jazz legacy, and to continue the bold and exciting directions that the AACM has charted for decades. Mitchell is thankful to mentors and teachers including: Jimmy Cheatham, Donald Byrd, Brenda Jones, Roscoe Mitchell, James Newton, George Lewis, John Eaton, Fred Anderson, Ernest Dawkins, John Fonville, Susan Levitin, Mary Stolper, John Sebastian Winston and Edward Wilkerson.

Source: Chicago News Cooperative

In recent years, Nicole Mitchell, an enterprising jazz flutist, modernist composer and leader of several inventive ensembles, has been a celebrated success story in Chicago music.

Last spring, she received an Alpert Award, worth $75,000, from the California Institute of the Arts. Her albums regularly appear on critics’ year-end lists; she earned Flutist of the Year honors from the Jazz Journalists Association three of the last five years; and she won the Downbeat Critics Poll in 2010 and 2011.

In 2010, she performed premieres of several works as artist-in-residence at the Chicago Jazz Festival. Her “Black Earth” ensembles, ranging from a quartet with strings to an 18-piece band, have made her a familiar presence throughout the United States and in Europe.

But Mitchell has been absent from the local scene lately. Her performances of her composition “Harambee: Road to Victory” with the Chicago Sinfonietta at Wentz Concert Hall in Naperville on Jan. 15 and at Symphony Center on Jan. 16, will be two of only a handful of appearances on local stages since July.

One reason is financial. It proved to be a challenge for even so accomplished a jazz artist to make a living at her craft here, so she moved 2,000 miles away, to Long Beach, Calif., to take a “dream job” and earn a steady paycheck.

In August Mitchell, 44, became assistant professor in a relatively new program integrating composition, improvisation and technology at the University of California, Irvine. “It’s always been important to me to have that role, as a teacher, because I feel really fortunate for the mentorships I’ve had,” she said.

But bound up with the desire to teach was the lure of financial security and benefits provided by a full-time faculty position, after 10 years as an adjunct teacher at various Chicago-area colleges. Since 1992 she had lived in the city, where she evolved from a flutist in others’ bands to an internationally recognized composer and performer.

It is perhaps surprising that she would have trouble making ends meet. But when Mitchell’s top-of-the-line flute was stolen in Italy 15 months ago, she had no insurance to cover the cost of replacing it. And winning the Alpert Award inspired not vacation plans, but rather relief at the prospect of paying off debts that included $50,000 in student loans.